Queues also began at 10pm yesterday at the Westfield London shopping centre, as fans were served with refreshments as they spent the night in the facility waiting to get their hands on the new phone.

Myf Ryan, the general manager of marketing at the Westfield, said: "Such global launches are always eagerly anticipated at Westfield London and we look forward to the exciting atmosphere that Apple fans will bring to the centre. We hope to see the same customers again at Apple's next product launch."

The same story is true in the US, Australia and four other countries where the iPhone 4S will today become available.

CNN has even reported that Steve Wozniak, the Apple co-founder, is currently at the front of the queue in his hometown of Los Gatos in California waiting to get the iPhone 4S. Apparently he's sat in a Pico armchair "sipping Diet Dr Pepper and scanning e-mails from his white iPad".

Powered by the dual-core A5 chip and Apple's latest iOS 5 operating system, the iPhone 4S features an eight megapixel camera, full HD video and voice control system Siri.

The SIM-free handset is available at all 33 Apple retail stores and selected Apple authorised resellers around the UK in black or white, priced at £499 for the 16GB model, £599 for the 32GB and £699 for the 64GB variant.